Jun 26, 2025

Duolingo

Grabbing attention

Joe Mullich

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The Duolingo logo is seen on a smartphone.

The Duolingo logo is seen on a smartphone.Gabby Jones—Bloomberg/Getty Images

In early 2025, Duolingo announced that its mascot was murdered—and then, two weeks later, revealed that Duo the Owl faked its own death as a ploy to get users to complete their daily language lessons. The green bird sure knows how to build buzz, helping to turn an educational app into a cultural phenomenon. "We're competing for those five minutes of your time you may spend on TikTok or Instagram," says Chief Marketing Officer Manu Orssaud. The company's bold and playful approach to brand-building has fueled its rapid growth: Duolingo more than doubled its monthly active users from 2022 to 2024, when it amassed more than 130 million and saw revenue rise around 40% year-over-year. A tongue-in-cheek cameo in Barbie (where the doofy husband learns Spanish on Duolingo) and a strategic partnership with Netflix’s Squid Game titled “Learn Korean or Else” helped power growth; the company monitors music, TV, and social media to identify emerging language interests. But the marketing would be useless without a great product, says Orssaud: "We want our product to be so delightful and satisfying that you want to play it every day.”